Page 63 of Pete and His Precious

I don’t blame her, and I’m not going to try to talk her out of that. If that’s what she wants, I can respect that. Although, that kind of goes against the whole idea that I was going to launch a charm offensive on her. Maybe I’m not respecting her career choices if I’m going to try to charm her into falling for me.

That’s a moral dilemma I’ll have to think about later. For right now, Zoe bites one of those lips I’m looking at, and I have to look away.

My fingers are tingling, and I’m pretty sure it’s because of the fact that kissing was mentioned in the vicinity of Zoe’s lips.Which, it seems weird that combination would make my fingers tingle, but it does.

“We were talking about kissing on the way here. It was part of our conversation. So, that wasn’t quite as far out as what you might have thought it was,” Leslie says. It seems like she might be trying to smooth out Miss Phyllis’s awkward statement, but I’m not sure. I just know that Zoe’s cheeks were pink before, but they’re fire engine red now, which looks just as good on her.

I think about how I had my arms around her when we were playing ping-pong yesterday, and I shouldn’t have allowed my mind to go there, because I want them around her again. And, I feel like it’s a very, very good day for kissing.

“It is definitely a beautiful day, and kissing is probably something you could do today,” Zoe says awkwardly. How does a person respond to a statement like that? Then, she finds her groove. “Can I start you guys off with something to drink?”

She goes around the table and takes our drink orders, and thankfully, I am not staring at her lips and I managed to order water.

“All right, you guys ready to order or should I come back with your drinks?”

I want her to come back with our drinks, just because that will increase the amount of time that we get to spend with her, but the ladies are ready to order, and I’m not going to make them wait for me.

I’ll just be honest here and admit that I can’t even tell you what I ordered.

“She is such a nice girl,” Miss Phyllis says after Zoe walks away.

“She’s has the right shape, too,” Tammy says, and then she ruins that by saying, “but I bet anything she’s gonna bring cold coffee back,”

I try not to smile. I’ve noticed that Tammy seems to find the negative in anything, and if there is no negative there, she’ll make something up. I’ve never gotten cold coffee here, although, I’m not a big coffee drinker, so I couldn’t say for sure how it normally is.

But, Miss Tammy is absolutely right about the shape of Zoe. It’s perfect. She might be considered chunky by other people, but she’s perfect in my eyes.

Of course, there was the awkward way we met, and I suppose I’ve seen a little more of her than I’ve seen of most women, and I guess I’m still in agreement with Miss Tammy. She’s perfect.

I certainly wouldn’t recommend that though. Until I got to know her, I thought that she didn’t have the kind of character that I was looking for in a woman.

She brings our drinks back almost immediately, and I can see the steam coming off of Miss Tammy’s coffee. If she says that’s cold... I’m going to call her out on it. She can say whatever she wants to, but even if it was cold, it’s not Zoe’s fault anyway.

Zoe walks away, and I know I need to get my mind on things besides her lips and kissing and her shape. So, I look at the ladies and say, “What did you want to talk to me about?”

They all look at me with the deer in the headlights look, like they totally forgot that they wanted to talk to me about anything.

That’s so odd.

Chapter 23

Zoe

“He’s here!” I say, as I pushed through the door, clutching my tray and notepad like they’re lifelines.

Connie is standing at the counter, putting an order together. Her head jerks up, and her brows draw down. “Who? Is there a politician visiting I don’t know about? Or maybe a saint?”

“Pete. He’s a policeman. He’s here.”

“Here?” Connie says, raising her brows and trying to look impressed, but she has no idea who Pete is.

“Animal rights policeman Pete. The cop who arrested me for indecent exposure. The...guy who sent the flowers.”

“Oh. That Pete. Oh,” she says, the first oh sounding completely different than the second one. The second one was, I gotta go check this guy out. So she goes to the door, and peeks through it.

“I don’t know what to do,” I say from behind her, grabbing hold of her hand and bringing her back.

“He’s cute,” she says, wiggling her brows at me.

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